Nokia’s problem — and I’ve heard this same story from at least half a dozen former and present Nokia employees who read DF — is that their handset business is fundamentally based around hardware teams. When they decide to make a phone, they put together a hardware team for that model, and that team makes all decisions. That’s why they have no cohesive software strategy. Nokia sees software as one component in a hardware-based view of the industry.
The iPhone is a palmtop computer, which happens to also be a phone. I don’t think that is what everyone wants or needs. Some people are happier with a phone that is just a phone. Or perhaps a phone that does a few palmtop-like things.
It seems to me that Nokia ought to continue to focus on hardware. It needs to produce the absolute best phone rather than trying to compete directly against the iPhone.
The problem, I suppose, is that that isn’t a high-margin business. Still, I think trying to play somebody else’s game is a lousy and losing strategy.
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